


Parker Never Gets Caught

by failsafe



Category: Leverage
Genre: Bonding, Character Study, Multi, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-21
Updated: 2015-12-21
Packaged: 2018-05-08 02:24:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5479778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/failsafe/pseuds/failsafe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Parker never gets caught except...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Parker Never Gets Caught

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Pameluke](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pameluke/gifts).



Parker has never been caught.

She thinks about it sometimes. Has thought about it – usually perched somewhere high above the scene of the crime. Sometimes, she has been a long upward glance's length from being caught, but she has always been sure that even if they saw her, she'd be gone before they could make it all the way up the stairs. She is fast, but she knows when to be still.

Sometimes, she has been seated right at a building's edge. Her legs dangle down and play with the pull of gravity, trusting her rig more than she's ever trusted the touch of another person. The ropes hold her tight while she can slip out of other people's reach, fast as water slipping through fingers while a little kid tries to hold onto drops of rain. Way up on the tops of buildings, the air can be very cold. And windy.

During a job, Parker keeps her hair tied back and protected, careful to never leave a single strand of it behind. But sometimes, at the end of a successful day when she has stacks of cash or the promise of them tucked tight to her chest, close to her heart, she pulls her cap off and a few of the loosened strands blow freely. Little strings of blonde, lighter than gold but pleasantly like it if she imagines, whip against the sides of her face – her cheekbones, her temples, giving her more and more reason to blink her eyes against the rush of air.

A piece of it long enough to reach her mouth tears free from its tie and finds its place to stick at the corner of her lips. Her lips curve in response and she reaches up to grasp at them, to put them back in their place. Exposed fingertips feel the air, too, and when she has tucked her hair back behind her ear, they search for something a little warmer. Close against her body, they find a place to land. The texture is rounded and a little rough, like a sunning snake warmed by her body heat. The ropes that make up her safety mechanism and her getaway feel familiar, warm, and hold her tight in a way that no person ever could.

Far below her, she notices some irregularity. Her muscles tense to prepare for movement before she can question it. Way down there, she sees what seems like a hustle of movement come in from the street. It could be in search of her, it might not be. It doesn't matter, because she is already on her feet.

“Time to go,” she mutters, to herself or perhaps to the harness that she has lovingly constructed just for this job. She runs her hand up and down, along it, testing but trusting. Then she is gone, another rush through the air to a chosen point. They will never catch her, never see her, never, ever touch her unless she wants them to.

\- - -

Sometimes, Parker runs away to avoid being caught.

Her throat feels like it is stitched together with little briars from some kind of scratchy bush. She doesn't know why she thinks of it that way, since she hasn't been outside since their last job, but she bets it's the fever. She is leaned back on Nate's couch, which he'd made sure to complain about her contaminating before giving her another blanket. It was a tattered one, but soft and pretty shades of peanut butter and ocean blues. It was soft, too, which was the main reason Parker had accepted it.

Now, she adjusts her neck and tries to squirm away from the achy, tired soreness. She makes a sound that causes her to cough. She wordlessly complains again before tucking a fistful of the blanket to a spot against her neck, right beneath her chin. She had escaped without blowing their cover, but not without diving into the painfully cold water down below the dock. It had been stupid, dangerous, scary, and thrilling. She had mostly been afraid of eels or something, though, and when she'd escaped the rush without anything biting her, she had thought to call the job a success.

But a week later, she is curled on Nate's couch, coughing and shivering and getting very tired of the TV.

“It was that stupid, cold water,” she observes aloud, interrupting the distant babble of the newscaster on the screen.

“What?” Eliot asks from a chair somewhere behind her head. There is a squeaking somewhere in front of her, too – the door opening as he answers. This seems to make him cut off the TV, which Parker doesn't feel like complaining about. Mostly, she feels like complaining that he hadn't been paying attention to her when he answers anyway. “It wasn't the cold water. That's not how colds and flu and stuff work,” he rambles as he gets up to take a plastic bag from Hardison's hand as he shuffles off his shoes at the door.

“It is, too,” Parker says, mostly because she wants to say it when there's a feeling right between her eyes that makes her feel like frowning whether she was to or not. She reaches up to rub at it.

“Yeah, it is, too,” Hardison agrees as he opens up another bag that he sets on the edge of the coffee table. Very close and she can hear the rustling and it makes her frown more. She can tell he's teasing, and she doesn't want him to be teasing when he agrees with her. But she can hear the smile in his voice, so she guesses it's not that bad. There are a lot of other things that are a lot more bad right now. “Uh, what is it we're talking about?”

“Stop it, Hardison,” Eliot complains as his voice moves through the kitchen. He's putting things away, and for once Parker wishes he would stop it just so his voice will stay in one place. It isn't worth complaining about that, though. The sooner she lets him do it, the sooner it will be over. The thought helps her to take a deep breath through her stuffy nose and let it go. “Parker thinks that it was because it was _cold_ in the water that she got sick. I was just telling her that wasn't true.” 

“Well, I mean... it could be. That water wasn't exactly city pool regulations clean,” Hardison says. When Parker peeks open her eyes, he's making a vague side to side gesture with his hand that means he's trying to hear both of them out. “And cold or hot can be a shock to your system.”

“I was fine,” Parker says, not caring if it contradicts her previous statement. When she's sick, she's allowed to contradict herself.

“Hey, there you are,” Hardison says with a little, silly and small wave when he sees that she's looking at him. “How're you feeling?”

“Bad,” Parker says, the obvious answer, giving him a serious frown.

“Yeah, but you'll be up kickin' my ass in no time, right? Pushing me off buildings...” he teases.

“No,” she says, because she doesn't want him to tease right now.

Hardison's eyebrows go through the process of lifting up and lowering themselves back down to normal again. He clears his throat and nods.

“Yeah,” he says, with another rattle. “I, uh... I got ya something,” he explains, opening the bag he'd kept and placed on the edge of the table again. He reaches in and there's a soft rattle of thin paper. He pulls something out, wrapped in wax paper and a napkin. She can't smell much, but what she can smell seems warm and makes her mouth water just a little. She's had nothing but soup, juice, and plain crackers for almost a week.

“What is it?” Parker asks, but then she doesn't have to ask because he presents it to her. She is pushed up onto her elbows just in time to see its two, perfect, almost heart-shaped arcs emerging from the wrapping paper. It is soft, fresh baked, and both the same and nothing like those hard little things that can sit down on the bar forever. _A pretzel_. 

Parker finishes sitting up, never taking her eyes off the thing in Hardison's outstretched hand. She considers it, her hands balled up lightly at her sides and pressed down against the couch. Finally, she speaks as she gets to her feet.

“My throat hurts,” she announces, finally meeting Hardison's eyes. There is a warmth of kindness in them – sweet and gentle – and she looks at him just in time to see that sparkle dull with just a little bit of what might be confusion and disappointment. She doesn't watch people's faces like Sophie does, but she thinks she can see something about Hardison in his. Her mouth opens and works a little as she searches for other words, but she knows she's still glaring just a little and can't help it.

“Uh... I uh... I know that,” Haridson says apologetically. He lowers his eyes back down to the back and quickly rustles through it again, retrieving another pretzel. “Uh, Eliot? Here, man. Got you one, too.”

“Thanks,” Eliot says, and for a moment that seems to be the only reaction. Then the movement in the kitchen stops and his footsteps purposefully approach Hardison and pluck the wrapper from his fingertips. He takes a bite out of it, chewing obviously as he glances at Parker. She knows he wants her to take hers, too. But she can't, because it's a pretzel and she feels terrible.

She glances toward the door, and even though just being out from under her blanket puts goosebumps all over her arm, she goes for it. She grabs a jacket from by the door, not minding whose it is, then she's stamping down into her boots with a cruel determination that might have broken Sophie's heart had she been around to see it.

“Where are you goin'?” Eliot asks, incredulous. It sounds like he might have still had a little pretzel to swallow that he'd forgotten about.

“Out,” Parker says, tugging at and running her fingers through her hair. She checks the jacket pocket for a wallet, finds one, and just assumes that it might be hers.

“You really shouldn't be goin' anywhere, Parker. You're sick,” Hardison pleads. She wants to listen to him, but she can't because her heart is beating too fast and she knows that can't be good for her health, either.

“I'm going to buy soup,” she says adamantly, then pushes her way out the door before he can hear whether or not they already have any. They pursue her down to the bar, but when she leaves she turns quickly and doesn't give them any indication as to whether she'd gone right or left. They can't catch her.

\- - -

Sometimes, she tries to get caught.

It had started one day, as many of the things she liked, by accident. They had been at a briefing, and there was a nervous energy coursing down into her fingers. She was eager to get started, to bring their mark down, and to work her way though security that actually rivaled the toughest she'd ever faced. She was so excited, she had forgotten to be scared. But maybe her fingers hadn't forgotten, because they'd grasped the first thing she could find on the surface before them, tying back her hair to show that she was ready for the planning that lay ahead.

It wasn't until she had taken it out that she'd noticed – the tie was too thick and an odd color, nothing like the hair ties she owned that were, mostly, black. This one was a dark shade of maroon and reminded her of camping gear somehow. She had toyed it back and forth between her fingers and come to the conclusion that the hair tie had belonged to Eliot.

She had put it away in a little box she kept for putting things away – things to look at, things that were nice. She had watched Eliot push his hair back from his forehead, push it back out of the way, for two days. And he never said a word.

That was how this particular reckless crime spree had begun.

It doesn't happen all the time or every day. She means Eliot no harm, and she wouldn't generally take his money anymore. Not without permission.

It happens when there's something small and left just within her reach. Always, it's something that reminds her of Eliot. Something she thinks he might miss, but just a little. Sometimes, it's cufflinks. Once, it was a guitar pick. Mostly, though, it's hair ties.

She wonders how long it will take him to notice. Sometimes, she wears them in her hair.

She waits. Then she pokes him gently in the arm. She presses her elbow into his side. She prances in front of him with a little bounce of her ponytail.

He never even seems to suspect.

Then, one day, he finally notices. She isn't even in the room, but she is in another, still gently turning and testing the elastic between her fingertips. She can't help it as a grin spreads across her face as he starts to rant.

“I don't get it,” he says, to no one but his own directionless annoyance. “I _know_ I just had one. Right here. Where did you go? Son of a—Fine. I get it. It's a sign. I should just chop it off. But I don't _get it_. Like socks in the damn dryer...” 

It's the last thing that makes Parker chuckle. She can't help it.  _'Like socks in the dryer'_ – which she has absolutely nothing to do with, in fact. 

“Parker!” Eliot calls out when he hears her. “You gotta laugh or you gonna come help me?”

“Help you what?” she calls back innocently, but she's still struggling to contain her laughter.

“You got a hair bow? I mean, a hair tie,” he explains, sighing wearily.

That last part pulls at her heart strings, even while she's still grinning. She gets up from her curled perch and fetches the little box, tucked away and not too hard to find. She walks into the room, opening up the box to reveal every single one of the little trinkets she has taken since beginning her little game.

When she catches Eliot's eyes and directs them to the opened box, she can hear it even before he says it.

“Dammit, Parker!” he says, looking up at her with a slightly jaw-slacked look of betrayal.

Parker doesn't quite know how to react, so she shrugs one shoulder and looks down, a little smile still clinging to her lips. She drops the last hair tie down on top of the pile. She's decided she doesn't care if he takes the other couple of things that were in the box, too – badges and bottle caps she'd thought were pretty.

“I was gonna give them all back,” she promises, glancing for his eyes again.

“You've been doin' this... for _how_ long?” he asks. 

“Not long,” Parker assures him, eyes widening as she realizes that might be the source of his betrayal. “It was just a little game,” she says, pushing the box over to him.

Tentatively, he pulls it just a little closer.

“Thanks for playing,” Parker adds – sweet and just a little smug – just before she backs away.

\- - -

Parker has never been caught, but sometimes she has had to make sacrifices to keep it that way.

She sees it coming, almost always. Knowing when she's almost met her match has kept her from ever actually doing it. More than making sure she's never been caught, that habit has often saved her life, too.

She has never been much of a fighter. She had known early on that she could learn how to kill people, if she really wanted, but she hadn't wanted to. She didn't want the people. She just wanted what she needed from them. She had never wanted to learn to fight, to kill, and when that choice puts her looking down the barrel of a dangerous weapon, she knows that running away is the only and the best option, no matter the cost.

When she cuts the line, it feels like cutting something deep in her gut. She does it exactly where she has to do it – the only chance she has to cut, run, and jump. She hopes that the last thing she'd said over the comms hadn't sounded like a goodbye, but if it had then she hopes it's not necessary.

After she falls, after the pain in her stomach that she hopes is just adrenaline, it's a little while before she's entirely sure what's happening again.

“Parker!” someone calls out, raw and demanding. Eliot. Daring her to be dead, demanding that she not be. She almost smiles, but then she winces and grimaces, noticing a lance of pain coming up from her leg. She adjusts herself carefully, realizing she still _can_ move basically everything and that what she can't hurts. She sighs, not sure if it's relief or just disgust. She blinks up, adjusting her eyes to the light above. Then she sees Eliot's shadow. She's supposed to answer him. “Parker!” the demand repeats. 

“Yeah,” she says, pushing to try and sit up, but that just brings another wince.

“Hold still,” Eliot demands, but her movement seems to have made room for him. He hops into the crate with her, leaning her back against his lap. She knows he knows what he's doing. She trusts him. But she also knows that this isn't strictly necessary. She's grateful and turns her head a little, distracting herself from the pain with the warmth of his shirt against his stomach.

“You okay?” she asks, maybe with a little wry twist and a faint, near-smile.

“Hardison, over here,” Eliot calls out with a wave instead of answering.

“Is she okay?” Hardison cries out, just as frantic.

“Fine!” Parker says, chuckling weakly after the deliberately aggressive growl – maybe mocking Eliot a little bit. “I think my leg might be hurt,” she says, a little quizzical.

“We've got you,” Hardison says as he pops up into her view. She smiles at him. She hesitates a little, but reaches up and grabs for Hardison's hand. He gives it to her, no resistance. She sees his shoulders relax.

“I know. I'll be okay,” she says, and she doesn't really want them to know how lucky that is. Because she'd known when to let it happen, when to fall, and when to just let go. When to get a little hurt so she'll have another shot. When to let them catch her.

Parker never gets caught – except when she wants to.

**Author's Note:**

> I really hope you enjoyed your fic! Happy Hollypoly!


End file.
